Random things I learned in the K1 process

[Mogambi 96]

I thought it might be interesting for those of us who have been through the K1 process in the Philippines and been granted the visa, to share some random tidbits that they think might help other. My fiance was granted her visa two weeks ago, and last week it was delivered from the embassy. She finished her CFO session three days ago, and now that it's all done (well until she gets here anyway I thought I'd share some random thoughts:

1) Make sure when she's getting her NBI clearance she tells them that it's for a US Fiance Visa. They will write the words 'For Travel to USA' on the green NBI that she gets, and this is what the US Embassy wants. This NBI clearance can take longer. In our case, it took almost three weeks to get. Allow extra time for this!

2) They do not care about local police reports. We had local police and baranguy clearances from Manila and Zamboanga just in case. They never looked at them.

3) My fiance lived in Kuwait for two years, and it caused me a lot of stress trying to figure out how to get a police clearance from Kuwait, as they say they will only grand that to current citizens. It took a long time to get the US Embassy to finally reply to me and tell me that because Kuwait won't give it, they won't expect it. I had done a lot of searching, even here and other visa sites, and nowhere did I ever find the answer to that one. Even immigration lawyers I talked to weren't sure. They just kept saying 'just go to the Kuwait embassy and they will give it'. Not true.

4) They did however demand police clearance from Thailand, where she also lived for two years. This took about a month to get, and involved first going to the Thai Embassy. If anyone needs help on that one, just let me know.

5) Getting your beneficiary's CENOMAR and Birth Certificate in the Philippines is super easy. At the Embassy, they want to see the official Birth Certificate, issued by the National Statistics Office, and can be ordered online. You go to https://www.ecensus.com.ph/Default.aspx and order them. Your fiance goes to the bank to make the payment, and voila. We had our CENOMAR three days after ordering, and the official NSO copy of her birth certificate 12 days later (only that long because she was born in the province and they had to go back to the microfische to find it).

6) While you are ordering the CENOMAR and Birth Certificate, order TWO. The US Embassy will take them (maybe they're in the sealed yellow envelope, I don't know) but it's cheap, and then you'll have a spare of each one.

7) no need to arrive at the US Embassy at 4am. My fiancé arrived at 6am and was still done by 10:30. I doubt the ones who arrived at 4am finished that much earlier.

8) Once you have booked your interview date, you are allowed to change it twice without penalty. If you try and change it the third time, you will have to pay the entire p15,000 fee again. I know this because we had to push our interview twice while waiting for the Thai police clearance to show up. Once we had it, I went to change it a third time (to move it back up a bit) and that's when I got the message that you can only change it twice.

9) the process is stressful because of so much waiting. But for anyone remotely organized, it's not 'hard' per se, and you don't need an immigration lawyer or visa service. My fiance lived a bunch of places, and so I have, and I work freelance, all of these things could have made it all harder. But still we sailed through without any RFE, administrative reviews, etc.

10) National Bookstore in the Philippines sells the absolute perfect plastic binder/holder things for use in organizing all your paperwork. They are like a dollar a piece, have plastic sleeves to hold all your paperwork. In the end we had four, one for our I-129F petition, one for things for the US Embassy Interview, and two to hold all of our evidence. Now it's all still nicely organized and ready to hang onto. I should have bought a hundred of them and made them available here, honestly, they absolutely perfect for K1 visa applications!!

Tim

I'd love to hear little things other people have learned going through the process.

[Mogambi 96]

Oh and one more thing:

11) the CFO Counseling session is more than just a 'class' your fiancé has to attend. They may and probably will interview her, and it's probably a good idea to bring all your embassy paperwork with you, photos, etc. Also bring that extra CENOMAR and Birth Certificate you got in advice step 6

[Pangga&Shine 7]

Awesome & Excellent Information! TY for sharing, I will bookmark this for Ms Sunshine too!!

[Hank_ 9,171]

1) The embassy doesn't care if its marked for travel to the USA, they just want a current NBI with all alias names.

Totally agree with getting extra copies of the certified birth certificate from NSO, I had my fiancee get 6 as they will come in handy here in the States.

[Mogambi 96]

Well I will say this, I've seen two colors for NBI clearance in the Philippines, yellow and green. They told my fiance that yellow one is just good for local use in the Philippines for employment, etc. They told her she needed the green one for a visa. So my warning was just, if you tell them it's for travel to the US on a K1 visa, at least you're sure to get the right one, and having 'For Travel to the US' on it, like they put on ours, probably doesn't HURT anything.

I can't say if there really is a difference between the yellow and green NBI. Anyone here have and use a Yellow NBI?

Maybe yellow was just the older color. I can't say for certain. But at the NBI office they definitely implied that the one she needed for the US Embassy was NOT the same one most people were getting. And as I said, ours took almost three weeks, while a normal NBI for employment can usually be gotten the same day.

So I think it still might be safer to tell them what it's for, just to avoid any confusion.

[Zharren Young 32]

mine has travel abroad and its accepted with no issue. all they need to see is all the name alias and no criminal record. Kuwait and saudi doesnt provide police clearance unless youre still residing there. i know this coz i was there and i didnt have to submit one.

[Hank_ 9,171]

Well I will say this, I've seen two colors for NBI clearance in the Philippines, yellow and green. They told my fiance that yellow one is just good for local use in the Philippines for employment, etc. They told her she needed the green one for a visa. So my warning was just, if you tell them it's for travel to the US on a K1 visa, at least you're sure to get the right one, and having 'For Travel to the US' on it, like they put on ours, probably doesn't HURT anything.

I can't say if there really is a difference between the yellow and green NBI. Anyone here have and use a Yellow NBI?

Maybe yellow was just the older color. I can't say for certain. But at the NBI office they definitely implied that the one she needed for the US Embassy was NOT the same one most people were getting. And as I said, ours took almost three weeks, while a normal NBI for employment can usually be gotten the same day.

So I think it still might be safer to tell them what it's for, just to avoid any confusion.

That very well may be true, I will ask... hang on. Just asked my fiancee, she said they will ask at NBI if its for visa (USA) or whatever, so they will issue the correct one. So yes ...

Edited May 27, 2012 by Hank_Amy

[The Nature Boy 4,224]

The only real thing I learned is that my wife is way smarter than I am.

[Hank_ 9,171]

you left yourself wide open with that one....

.... we learned your wife is way smarter than you also!!

[The Nature Boy 4,224]

you left yourself wide open with that one....

.... we learned your wife is way smarter than you also!!

:help::help:

[TropicalRose 0]

Hi! I just got my green NBI clearnace today. I went there at 8:15am and they released

my clearance at 10am.It would have been earlier if not for the 30 minutes

brownout.

The yellow is for the local, yes. While the green is given for those who

are going out of the country. But they do asked for the purpose and I told them

for travel abroad. If the country one is going to is the U.S.,Canada, Australia,

U.K, they put it in the clearance,like they did in mine. But if it's in the middle

east and Asia, the purpose is just travel abroad.

[Azteca143 9]

I thought it might be interesting for those of us who have been through the K1 process in the Philippines and been granted the visa, to share some random tidbits that they think might help other. My fiance was granted her visa two weeks ago, and last week it was delivered from the embassy. She finished her CFO session three days ago, and now that it's all done (well until she gets here anyway I thought I'd share some random thoughts:

1) Make sure when she's getting her NBI clearance she tells them that it's for a US Fiance Visa. They will write the words 'For Travel to USA' on the green NBI that she gets, and this is what the US Embassy wants. This NBI clearance can take longer. In our case, it took almost three weeks to get. Allow extra time for this!

2) They do not care about local police reports. We had local police and baranguy clearances from Manila and Zamboanga just in case. They never looked at them.

3) My fiance lived in Kuwait for two years, and it caused me a lot of stress trying to figure out how to get a police clearance from Kuwait, as they say they will only grand that to current citizens. It took a long time to get the US Embassy to finally reply to me and tell me that because Kuwait won't give it, they won't expect it. I had done a lot of searching, even here and other visa sites, and nowhere did I ever find the answer to that one. Even immigration lawyers I talked to weren't sure. They just kept saying 'just go to the Kuwait embassy and they will give it'. Not true.

4) They did however demand police clearance from Thailand, where she also lived for two years. This took about a month to get, and involved first going to the Thai Embassy. If anyone needs help on that one, just let me know.

5) Getting your beneficiary's CENOMAR and Birth Certificate in the Philippines is super easy. At the Embassy, they want to see the official Birth Certificate, issued by the National Statistics Office, and can be ordered online. You go to https://www.ecensus.com.ph/Default.aspx and order them. Your fiance goes to the bank to make the payment, and voila. We had our CENOMAR three days after ordering, and the official NSO copy of her birth certificate 12 days later (only that long because she was born in the province and they had to go back to the microfische to find it).

6) While you are ordering the CENOMAR and Birth Certificate, order TWO. The US Embassy will take them (maybe they're in the sealed yellow envelope, I don't know) but it's cheap, and then you'll have a spare of each one.

7) no need to arrive at the US Embassy at 4am. My fiancé arrived at 6am and was still done by 10:30. I doubt the ones who arrived at 4am finished that much earlier.

8) Once you have booked your interview date, you are allowed to change it twice without penalty. If you try and change it the third time, you will have to pay the entire p15,000 fee again. I know this because we had to push our interview twice while waiting for the Thai police clearance to show up. Once we had it, I went to change it a third time (to move it back up a bit) and that's when I got the message that you can only change it twice.

9) the process is stressful because of so much waiting. But for anyone remotely organized, it's not 'hard' per se, and you don't need an immigration lawyer or visa service. My fiance lived a bunch of places, and so I have, and I work freelance, all of these things could have made it all harder. But still we sailed through without any RFE, administrative reviews, etc.

10) National Bookstore in the Philippines sells the absolute perfect plastic binder/holder things for use in organizing all your paperwork. They are like a dollar a piece, have plastic sleeves to hold all your paperwork. In the end we had four, one for our I-129F petition, one for things for the US Embassy Interview, and two to hold all of our evidence. Now it's all still nicely organized and ready to hang onto. I should have bought a hundred of them and made them available here, honestly, they absolutely perfect for K1 visa applications!!

Tim

I'd love to hear little things other people have learned going through the process.

i had my NBI stating travel abroad,it was fine...i worked in Kuwait,we search about

getting Police clearance but it was impossible for the person who's no longer there,and

the US embassy actually don't need it,but Singapore we had to provide,it took 10 working

days.We really give time for the PC from other country to arrived before our interview.

for BC i had 2 extra copy from NSO.just in case...i did my documents organized even

label it but the consul didn't bother to see it,whenever they ask something i had to pull out from my folder.they look for our photo's,chat log's for proof of on going relationship.

the process can be really stressful,just be Patient and Pray always...God Bless us all!!!

[southcalhog 43]

One more thing! You need no Police Certificate from the UAE...Dubai, Kuwait, and all other places there, You right, you cant get it! I have heard this debated from time to time.My Fiancee worked in Dubai for a year. you can go to " WWW.Travel.state.gov" for all that information. No need to stress, YOU DONT NEED POLICE CERTIFICATE FROM UAE! MY fiancee had her interview last month in April, they never ever asked for it, although she had been to dubai for over a year and they had all that information. Good Luck! :thumbs:

Edited May 28, 2012 by southcalhog

[gretchen_darren 67]

The one thing I learned. Asawa ko is so wonderful, it is hard to live without her. I wished I had married a filipina back when I was 25 instead of waiting until now. But maybe, just maybe beucase of my past, I really treasure her more......

[Emmysaur 29]

The one thing I learned. Asawa ko is so wonderful, it is hard to live without her. I wished I had married a filipina back when I was 25 instead of waiting until now. But maybe, just maybe beucase of my past, I really treasure her more......

If I was your wife I would be very upset to read the bolded part